Our attention has been drawn to the above passage in Captain Skinner's work, by its ready illustration of the views and conclusions of the late Dr. Knox, in his invaluable _Spirit of Despotism_, Section 2, "Oriental manners, and the ideas imbibed in youth, both in the East and West Indies, favourable to the spirit of despotism." How forcibly applicable, on the present occasion, is the following extract:--"from the intercourse of England with the East and West Indies, it is to be feared that something of a more servile spirit has been derived than was known among those who established the free constitutions of Europe, and than would have been adopted, or patiently borne, in ages of virtuous simplicity. A very numerous part of our countrymen spend their most susceptible age in those countries, where despotic manners remarkably prevail. They are themselves, when invested with office, treated by the natives with an idolatrous degree of reverence, which teaches them to expect a similar submission to their will, on their return to their own country. They have been accustomed to look up to personages greatly their superiors in rank and riches, with awe; and to look down on their inferiors in _property_ with supreme contempt, as slaves of their will and ministers of their luxury. Equal laws and equal liberty at home appear to them saucy claims of the poor and the vulgar, which tend to divest riches of one of the greatest charms, over-bearing dominion. We do, indeed, import gorgeous silks and luscious sweets from the Indies, but we import, at the same time, the spirit of despotism, which adds deformity to the purple robe, and bitterness to the honied beverage." "That _Oriental_ manners are unfavourable to liberty, is, I believe, universally conceded. The natives of the East Indies entertain not the idea of independence. They treat the Europeans, who go among them to acquire their riches, with a respect similar to the abject submission which they pay to their native despots. Young men, who in England scarcely possessed the rank of the gentry, are waited upon in India, with more attentive servility than is paid or required in many courts of Europe. Kings of England seldom assume the state enjoyed by an East India governor, or even by subordinate officers. Enriched at an early age, the adventurer returns to England. His property admits him to the higher circles of fashionable life. He aims at rivalling or excelling all the old nobility in the splendour of his mansions, the finery of his carriages, the number of his liveried train, the profusion of his tables, in every unmanly indulgence which an empty vanity can covet, and a full purse procure. Such a man, when he looks from the window of his superb mansion, and sees the people pass, cannot endure the idea, that they are of as much consequence as himself in the eye of the law; and that he dares not insult or oppress the unfortunate being who rakes his kennel or sweeps his chimney."